The Death Masks

The Museum holds 10 death masks of prisoners executed by hanging in Worcester's gaol in the early 19th Century. At the time, this was attached to the old hospital (Castle Street) via an underground tunnel. These death masks were found languishing in the basement of the Castle Street Worcester Royal Infirmary in the 1930s by George Marshall (the founder of our collection). The bodies of hanged criminals were taken from the gaol under the road to Castle Street to be used for dissection and examination (as only criminals' bodies were allowed to be dissected in the UK at this point).

 

Recently, archaeologists have uncovered a section of the tunnel on the Castle Street site and, rather gruesomely, the first 'find' in the tunnel was a human tooth! The University of Worcester have also found dissected human remains on the Infirmary site. See the BBC website for more information.

 

These casts were made in order to study the characteristics of the criminals' personalities using physiognomy (shape and size of the head) and phrenology (study of the site of different abilities on the head). This was thought to be useful in predicting criminal behaviour. These practices were not long adhered to in the medical profession though traces of these ideas clearly still remain in public psyches when we talk of close-together eyes indicating an untrustworthy character, or a large, meaty head implying a thuggish nature! Victorian literature is rife with references to these ideas.

 

The only head we know much about is that of a microcephalic individual who was hanged for sheep stealing. This individual would have been severely disabled and, because of the specific nature of microcephaly, would not have had the mental capacity to understand right and wrong. There is also a possibility that he was framed for this crime but we will never know.

 

The death mask of the microcephalic man on display in the mental health case.